


Dancing With Your Ghost

by unluckystriker



Category: Band of Brothers (TV 2001)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Idiots to friends to lovers, Just Like Heaven au, M/M, Medical Inaccuracies, Mutual Pining, Not Really Character Death, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-12
Updated: 2021-01-12
Packaged: 2021-03-16 23:28:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 11,050
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28715025
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unluckystriker/pseuds/unluckystriker
Summary: All Babe wanted was a decent apartment. One that wasn't some hippy shrine, or decked out in weird statues and freaky portraits. A place he could feel comfortable laying his head down at night. When he finally finds the place of his dreams, however, the last thing he expects is to find it haunted by the ghost of a grouchy Cajun who doesn't even remember who he is or how he got there. And what he really doesn't expect is to fall in love along the way...Or, theJust Like HeavenAU you never knew you needed.Reupload - previously titled 'This Ain't Heaven (But It Could Be)'
Relationships: Edward "Babe" Heffron/Eugene Roe, Minor or Background Relationship(s)
Comments: 7
Kudos: 10





	1. The One Where Gene Dies

**Author's Note:**

> _Rolls up amid a global pandemic, three years late with Starbucks._ Heeyyyy...!
> 
> Sooo, to those of you seeing this for the first time - welcome! Absolutely nothing has happened ever that you need to worry your pretty little heads about. To those who are coming back... Oops? I'm so sorry. I legit don't know how this happened. I had several chapters written out and ready for upload, but life happened and I fell off updating, which made me fall off writing all together, and now here I am three years later, feeling like an absolute shit. I promise I never forgot about this fic and always intended on getting back to it, it just... took me a while to actually do that, which is, frankly, just typical. But I really, really don't want to let this fic die. So I've gone back, revised and reworked the previous two chapters I'd published already, and decided to start fresh; new title and all! It's still the same fic, just... better. I hope.
> 
> I'm not going to promise how often or quickly I'll upload, but I _can_ promise that I won't let this fic die. Whether updates are weeks or months in between, I'll always come back to this. As for the upload under the previous title, I'm going to be leaving it up for a few weeks so anyone who had subscribed to it and are still interested can jump over to this one instead.
> 
> And to those of you who are new to this little calamity - this fic is based off of the 2005 _unit_ of a film, Just Like Heaven. It follows the movie for the most part, but I've changed a few things here and there to better include some more of the Easy boys, and molded it to fit our boys' personalities a little bit better. Rating may change in the future, who knows, honestly.

The cool air smelled of rain and magnolias and morning dew; familiar and comforting. It settled on his tongue like saccharine sweetness, lapped at his cheeks until they were flushed a faint pink with the chill. The fog surrounding him rolled off the foliage in waves, wrapped around his still form in a familiar embrace, made his skin slick in a cool contrast to the sun’s warmth at his back.

_“Eugene…”_

He could practically feel the blades of grass cutting through the soles of his shoes, making him want to curl his toes into the dirt; bury them up to his ankles like he used to do in the creek as a child. Goosebumps ran up and down his arms as cicadas and crickets trilled all around him and oak trees danced in the breeze. There was no need to open his eyes; he knew exactly where he was. Could practically hear his Grand Mère’s windchimes in the distance, see the bushels of flowers at his feet, feel the familiar wooden slats of the bench he was sat on digging into the backs of his thighs. Automatically, he found his fingers searching out and tracing that one knot which he knew marred the otherwise smooth surface, scraping blunt nails back and forth along the crater’s ragged edge.

_“Eugene…”_

He hadn’t felt this at-peace in ages. Each breath pulled him further and further under. Settled in his lungs with a warmth that radiated throughout his whole body; seeped into his bones like he had seen the sun and swallowed it whole. He was content to stay here forever—

_“Yo, Doc!”_

Eugene Roe gave an undignified snort and drew out a low groan from where he had been unceremoniously slumped over the cheap staff-room table, Nurse Spina’s hand still gripping his shoulder like a vice.

Tired eyes cracked open blearily to the nurse’s ridiculous grin hovering above him, in what Eugene immediately thought to be a sick imitation of some sad sack’s second-rate guardian angel, and was momentarily hit with the irrational urge to wrap his hands around his throat.

Whatever blissful state he had managed to fall into just moments before was gone, replaced instead by a persistent chill and the grating drone of fluorescent lights humming overhead. It was not rain, nor magnolias, or morning dew, but the sour taste of stale sweat and iodoform which settled itself on the back of his tongue; the calming song of cicadas instead replaced with the general chaos of the hospital’s bustling corridors. It was a crude reminder of where he was, and, regretfully, where he was not.

Trying to preserve whatever dignity he had left, Eugene attempted to right himself in his seat, immediately regretting it when his neck gave a nasty twinge and brown crumbs tumbled down of their own volition from where they had embedded themselves deep into the creased meat of his cheek...

It seemed, this time, that he couldn’t even manage to drag himself the fifty feet down the hall and two steps to the left, where the on-call room was literally waiting with open doors. A trend which (though he’d been trying hard to ignore) seemed to be on the rise these past few weeks, if recent sleeping habits were anything to go by. The sheets were rough and smelled like bleach, the mattresses thin and covered in cold, sticky plastic, thundering in his ears at the smallest twitch, but at least it would have prevented this bone-shattering ache that came with literally passing out in a cheap, plastic chair for who-knows-how-long. Hell, there was a damn couch ten feet to his left! Gene gazed over with envy at the young resident who had curled herself up against the plush, ratty cushions, snoring softly to whatever she currently had running through those tangled headphones. That could so easily have been _him._

Hissing and groaning again, he swiped at the remaining crumbs with his sleeve, making a face as they fell to his lap— had he eaten anything before he passed out? He didn’t think so— then reached up to knead at the muscles in his neck, tentatively working away the pain with careful fingers.

When he did speak, his voice was thick with sleep. “How long was I out?”

Spina shot a cursory glance to the watch on his wrist and gave Eugene a commiserating pat on the shoulder. “About half an hour,” he said. The sympathy in his voice was palpable; they’d all experienced those nights, once in a while. Unfortunately for Gene, ‘once in a while’ seemed to come about on a near weekly basis.

He scrunched his eyes closed, enduring the mild burn which sent stars exploding behind his lids, then opened them wide, taking a deep breath and trying to blink away the fuzziness which threatened to creep closer at the edge of his vision. Vaguely he could hear Spina’s words vibrating through the air, but his mind was having trouble latching onto them. An echo of windchimes in the back of his mind, the ghost of a breeze kissing his cheek... Eyes grew heavy for just a moment, until he found himself nodding along mindlessly to Spina’s words; his body working on autopilot as his brain fought to kick back into gear.

“Alright, alright…” he conceded, “I’ll be right there.”

Spina nodded and with one last pat on the back turned away, saying he’d be waiting for him outside when he was ready. Eugene could only nod again, trying to refrain from letting out the miserable whine that was threatening to build up at the back of his throat. It was, regrettably, a feeling he was intimately familiar with. Forcing himself to stay conscious, just a little while longer. Another second, a minute, an hour. Digging his nails in, breathing deeply, and refusing to let his mind drift away, like he so desperately wanted. No matter how many times he found himself here, tired and miserable, it never got any easier.

Even worse, it was a Hell of his own making. He could have gone home hours ago. _Should_ have gone home hours ago, if he were being truly honest. But they were already understaffed and patients kept piling in, and the desperate need to be of some help was almost overwhelming.

So he sat himself up, shook himself out, and told himself what he always did in these moments: he’d endured worse. Half hour wasn’t bad; half hour was fine. He’d been on longer shifts with less sleep. Once worked a twenty-nine with nothing but a six-minute cat-nap and two shots of espresso in between. Hell, compared to that, this should be a damn cake walk.

It was that mantra which finally managed to propel him up and out of the plastic blue chair, feeling for all the world like an invisible force was trying to drag him back down. He shook his head. Baby steps, he thought, and willed himself almost instinctively over to the coffee machine on shaky legs. It was only marginally better than the luke-warm, watered-down sludge they served in the cafeteria, but it was still coffee. Eugene grabbed the largest paper cup he could find and filled it to the brim with cheap, steaming Americano, completely bypassing the creams and sugars stacked haphazardly to his left. It was in this state— leaning heavily against the dirty counter and blinking blearily down at his liquid life partner— that the head nurse Renée LeMaire found him moments later.

Her blonde hair, where it was pinned up in careful braids around her head, looked like a virtual halo, glowing and ethereal, under the harsh hospital lights; white lab coat billowing out behind her like wings with each sharp, graceful stride. Gossip around the in-patients, if you could believe it, claimed her to be an Angel. But Eugene’s dark eyes immediately zeroed in on crossed arms, pursed lips, and stony expression, and was sorely reminded of his Mama sitting him down before bed as a kid, relaying horror stories of God’s righteous fury, delivered down by divine hands and flaming swords. He loved her dearly, he did, but that expression— the one that eerily reminded him of a mother intent on scorning a young child— never failed to make his blood run cold, even after all these years. 

“Eugene!” she hissed; smooth French accent making even hot indignation sound like a hymn, “How long have you been here?”

He got the distinct impression that no matter what he told her it would be the wrong answer. Better to just go with the truth, then, he thought. His eyes crinkled in the corners as he crunched the numbers in his head, drunk with exhaustion; the memories pouring in slow and heavy, like molasses over ice. What was it now, hour twenty-five? Twenty-six? No, it must have been verging on nearly—

“Uh… twenty-eight?”

Shit. Eyebrows shot up to her hairline and hands clamped white-knuckled around her hips. Wrong answer.

_“Twenty-eight? Mais, c’est fou, ça!_ Go home, Eugene! We can handle things without you for a few hours, non?”

“I know, I know.” He clutched his coffee closer to his chest like it was precious, and brought a hand up to rub at his furrowed brow. He swore he could feel a headache brewing, just behind his temples. Knew the coffee would probably add to it, but figured he could just snag some ibuprofen from the nurse’s station later on if it got any worse, as he’d done so many times before. From the corner of his eye he could see a few nurses skittering away like rabbits, desperate to escape Renée’s ire. He was almost tempted to smile, and he probably would if he didn’t know for a fact it would prompt a sharp flick to the earlobe in retaliation. It was a familiar routine they’d carved out for themselves, way back when they were still in their residency. Yet Eugene knew that at the heart of it, it was not anger the nurse was feeling, necessarily, but concern. So, taking a tentative sip, Eugene almost found comfort in letting the same old excuses tumble willingly off his tongue. “But I’ve been waiting on those x-rays for trauma four, and I was supposed to do a patch-up on one of Sobel’s guys—” he glanced at his watch, gave an internal sigh, “— _zut_ , twenty minutes ago, which means I’m already late. _Pardonnez-moi._ ”

Renée whirled around as the doctor attempted to scooch by. Evidently she wasn’t letting him off that easy, though truthfully he’d be disappointed if she did.

“ _Sobel?_ ” Eugene gave a full-body wince. Probably could have left that part out... “That _cowboy_ —” she spat the word like it left a foul taste on her tongue, “—can take care of his own patients, Eugene, he certainly boasts about it enough! You need to go home and get some rest! You cannot work when you are dead on your feet, _cher_ , you know this.”

“I know, and I will,” he reassured her, retreating backwards through the door before she could cuff him on the back of the head, narrowly missing a passing technician for his trouble, “Just as soon as I’m done this!”

“Eugene!”

“Soon as I’m done this, Renée! _Je me promets!_ ”

Renée watched him escape through the door with pursed lips and a shake of her head. That man was going to be the death of her— if he didn’t get himself killed first. With a huff she turned to the coffee machine, pouring her own cup with more force than necessary, ignoring her fellow nurses who gave her a wide berth as they scrambled in or out of the break room. “ _Fais ceci, Renée, fais ça, Renée. Arrêter cet idiot de se faire tuer, Renée. Il faut être bête comme ce garçon là._ ”

* * *

Out in the corridor Eugene found Spina leaning against the wall, casually skimming a relatively small but sizable stack of folders. Eugene managed an upward jerk of his chin in greeting, too preoccupied with getting down as much coffee as his tongue could handle to bother with anything verbal. Spina nodded back with a knowing smirk and kicked off the wall, both of them weaving in and around foot traffic together with practiced ease, flipping through patients’ folders as they went. It was only after the fifth file that Eugene finally caught on to the fact that half of these patients weren’t even _his_. He had the clearance to give his own consultation, sure, but that didn’t stop him from throwing Spina an unimpressed (if slightly bleary-eyed) glare from over the rim of his cup when he noticed, uncaring in that moment that it probably wasn’t the nurse’s fault in the first place.

And upon closer inspection, he wasn’t happy to see that a good half of these were in fact Doctors Sobel or Dike’s cases. Moreover, it was painfully obvious that the reason they had been shifted onto him in the first place was more than likely because the doctors themselves thought the cases were too ‘beneath them’ to merit their ‘expert advice’, whatever the hell _that_ meant.

Eugene huffed and cocked his jaw, running his tongue along his teeth in obvious irritation. He’d deal with those morons later, he told himself, when he could barrel through a full sentence without yawning. For now he had to focus on the patients. So Eugene continued to leaf through every file, dutifully skimming them and giving his input before depositing them back in Spina’s arms.

Adams, for instance, only needed to know how to care for and redress her sutures then could immediately be discharged. That was an easy one, they didn’t even need a doctor for that, Eugene thought. Any qualified nurse could take care of it. What was more worrying, though, was Ellis’ swollen ankles. One of Dike’s patients, he noted. The doctor had marked it down as hairline fractures, but Eugene, dumbfounded, didn’t even see any evidence of x-rays in their file. Unless they failed to mark it down (which he doubted; the nurses here tended to be more competent than half the on-call doctors), it appeared that Dike had just thrown out the first diagnosis that had come to mind without even bothering to verify his findings.

Eugene huffed and frowned, skimming over the file again.

A hairline fracture, in both ankles? Possible, but unlikely. He’d get some radiographs done just in case, but considering the patient’s age and weight, Eugene was more concerned with ruling out something more serious, like possible congestive heart failure or liver disease. Beemers were always a little more tricky to pin down. Besides the x-rays, Eugene ordered an EKG to be performed as soon as possible. And speaking of fractures…

“Where are we on those x-rays for trauma four?”

“Mrs. Kowalski? The lab’s all backed up, Gene, it’s a mess down there. Last I heard they were still being processed. I’ll send someone down to check it out.”

“Thank you.”

“Speaking of checking something out,” Eugene just barely suppressed a groan, bringing his coffee cup to his lips in a desperate plea for the nurse to take the hint and shove off, afraid of where this conversation was obviously heading. No such luck. He could practically hear the coy smile in the man’s voice as he smoothly transitioned into a familiar old song and dance. “You still single? ‘Cause I’ve got a friend who—”

“ _X-rays_ , Spina!”

“Okay, okay!” The nurse cackled, clearly amused, and raised his palms in surrender, turning on his heel and heading back to the nurse’s station with a rhythmic squeak of his fluorescent pink Nike’s. Relief curled low in Eugene’s belly, like dodging a bullet, but with it came the sick dread of knowing this conversation was far from over.

Ralph Spina was an excellent nurse— there was no question. The two had quickly grown to be good friends, however reluctantly on Gene’s part, ever since Spina’s first shift at TJUH three years ago, when Sobel came upon the nurse and apparently saw a shiny new target for his ever cruel agenda. Normally, he would just ignore it. The nurses can handle themselves just fine, Renée always said, and bringing the man’s ire down on his own head was not exactly on his to-do list. But seeing the normally confident nurse stutter and shake, blundering through what should have been a simple procedure simply because the other man was relentlessly taunting him from across the cot... It was the last straw that finally sent Eugene over the edge; loudly and spitefully calling the doctor out on his own incompetence in front of a room full of bug-eyed medical staff and tittering patients.

It was a day that had gone down in infamy— and one he’d been paying dearly for ever since. Not only in the form of a heavier caseload thanks to the good doctor, but in Spina’s own particular brand of torture. Trying to set him up with his friends, or cousins, or virtual strangers he’d bumped into on the street, to show his apparent appreciation. It never ended. In fact, it only seemed to get worse when the man broke up with his girlfriend a year ago, apparently choosing to focus all his energy on trying to set Eugene up with the “love of his life” instead of mourning his own failed relationship, or, contrarily, trying to start a new one.

Did he do this with all his friends, he had to wonder, or did Eugene really just come off as being that pathetic?

Sighing, he brought his free hand up to pinch the bridge of his nose. Could feel the headache creeping up on him again like a spectre, prodding to be let in. Face contorted into a sour frown at the uncomfortable feeling, shaking his head lightly in a vain attempt of trying to dislodge the sensation. When that didn’t work he took a quick swig of the hot, brown sludge cupped in his hand and tried to distract himself by flipping once more through his latest patient’s file— a Mrs. Morris, if he was reading Sobel’s chicken scratch correctly.

He had his nose buried in her chart when he entered the patient’s “room”, knocking on a nearby beam to announce his presence, for lack of an actual door. The whole space was bare-bones; exactly the same as the adjoining areas. A large monitor and equipment above a basic hospital bed, intravenous pole, small table and sink with various locked drawers, and a bin next to a couple of plastic chairs, not unlike the one Eugene himself had been slumped in mere moments ago. On the wall hung a faded print of a generic grassy landscape in a gaudy yellow frame— the same print he’d seen in half a dozen other rooms in just the last few hours, and never failed to disappoint.

Ripping his eyes away from the monstrosity, he spotted his patient immediately, propped up in bed with one arm hooked up to an IV and the other wrapped in what he assumed used to be a blue dish towel, recently turned a grisly shade of brown. His stomach turned with guilt at the scene. He should have been here twenty-five minutes ago, not slumped over in a puddle of his own drool and the mysterious leftovers of someone else’s pack-lunch.

Clearing his throat, Eugene set his coffee and file down on the small table, praying he didn’t look as tired and miserable as he felt. At least she wasn’t alone, he thought, as he noticed a younger woman in plaid PJs taking up the seat in the corner amongst a mountain of coats and bags. He shook the young woman’s hand first, then, at an awkward angle, gently clasped the patient’s where she was hooked up to the intravenous, acutely aware of the injury the other hand had sustained. An accident, her file had said. Making a late-night snack when she apparently slipped and the knife sliced clean into her palm. Eugene had tsked when he read it. The vast majority of patients he received were thanks to everyday tasks somehow gone awry— like a knife going rogue when making a damn sandwich at ass-o’clock in the morning.

Human beings, he’d come to realise, were ridiculously fragile at the best of times. And endlessly reckless besides...

“Mrs. Morris, my name is Doctor Roe. I’m sorry Doctor Sobel couldn’t be here, he got a little… tied up. But I promise you, you’re in good hands.”

“I’m sure I am,” she purred, as Eugene reached over to inspect the wound. “And it’s _‘Miss.’_ , Doctor, please. I’ve been divorced a long time.”

Eugene pinched his lips and cleared his throat awkwardly at the thinly veiled implication, trying to focus all his attention on the task at hand and cataloguing the injury in his mind (clean cut, bleeding slowed to a gentle crawl, not particularly deep but definitely in need of stitches).

Still, he didn’t miss the way the woman in the corner (Miss. Morris’ daughter-in-law, he would later surmise) groaned and sunk further into her seat. Or the way the patient’s eyes positively devoured him, head to toe, as he attempted to mend the wound. She was an attractive enough woman, he supposed. A little plump around the edges, with rosy cheeks and chin-length, curly brown hair, intermittent with stripes of grey and copper where the box-dye had begun to fade. But she was also at least twice his own age, and the thought alone was enough to make him recoil. He felt not unlike a mouse, waiting for the cat to pounce, and understood all at once why they called them ‘cougars’. It spurred him to go a little faster than he normally would, tweezing out the small fibers that had woven themselves into the dead tissue and disinfecting it thoroughly before going in with the sutures. Nurse Anna Chiwy, damn her, merely grinned knowingly and snickered when she came in to check the patient’s vitals before flitting out of the room with a decidedly peppier step than when she had entered.

That one was definitely going to be cropping up in the gossip mill by the end of the day, he thought, and shook his head in resignation.

Nearly twenty minutes later, her palm was back in near-working order and Eugene was growing increasingly more desperate to make his escape. Twenty minutes of awkwardly shuffling away from wandering hands and roaming eyes was twenty too many, in Gene’s opinion, thank you very much. After the third incident where he caught her pointedly trapping her ruby red lips between tea-stained teeth and making aborted fluttering motions with her eyes in his general direction, the doctor had to wonder if maybe that was the true reason Sobel had pawned her off on him instead— he certainly wouldn’t put it past him, though a heads up would have been nice— and resolved to hate the man just a little bit more for the trouble.

On the bright side, however, he figured those radiographs had to have been ready by now— and if not he’d damn well go down there and get them himself, if it meant making his escape any time sooner.

Finally coming to a close, he gave his usual spiel as he made himself busy, wrapping her hand in gauze and disposing of the waste, then taking his time to thoroughly lather his hands under the tap. Anything to keep himself from making direct eye contact until absolutely necessary.

“That’s it, Miss. Morris,” he said, “You’re done. The nurse will be by in a moment to unhook you from the IV. Just do as I said and it shouldn’t give you any trouble. And if there’s anything else I can do for you—” In a moment of naive generosity, he reached down to offer a reassuring hand, and gave a start when her own clammy ones shot up, latching greedily around his wrist and tugging him into her periferal. The doctor faltered for a moment as he set to gently disentangle himself from the woman’s deceptively iron-clad grip, mentally groaning. Why was it _always_ the pensioners?

“Marry me?”

Eyebrows shot up to his hairline at the unexpected proposal, gaze darting over to her daughter-in-law sitting in the corner, who now had her head buried deep in her hands, body slumped so far down the chair that it looked like she wanted to melt right into the building’s foundation. Eugene awkwardly cleared his throat and plastered a tight smile onto his face.

“Maybe another time, Miss. Morris, I kinda got my hands full today.”

The daughter-in-law’s embarrassed squawk followed Eugene as he made his hasty retreat down the hallway, complaining loudly that she couldn’t take her anywhere anymore and ‘wasn’t this _just_ like her anyway’.

It wasn’t the first proposal from a patient he’d gotten in his career, by any means; in fact it seemed to be par for the course in recent years, for reasons Gene had yet to figure out. But to be fair, the patients who did ask were usually a lot more drugged out of their minds when they tended to pop the question. Miss. Morris… Miss. Morris was only an anomaly in that she hadn’t a drop of morphine in her system and was, presumably, frightfully sincere in her proposal. He shuddered at the thought.

“Gettin’ married again? Am I invited to the wedding?”

Eugene looked up to see Spina walking his way, mercifully clutching a stack of radiographs under his right arm.

“Huh?”

“You get this look when patients propose to you. Like a constipated otter.”

God damn it, Anna. The doctor rolled his eyes. He was well and truly done with this conversation now, thank you very much. All he wanted was to sew some damn people back together so he could go home and pass out on his couch for at least twenty-four hours. Instead he snagged one of the x-rays from the stack with more force than necessary and held it up to the light, cataloguing each shard and splinter making up the mangled bone, and mentally piecing it back together like a puzzle.

“You give any thought to tonight?”

“Tonight?” he murmured, holding up another one taken from a different angle and comparing it to the first. How did one fall cause so much damage?

“Yeah, tonight. I told you about it a couple days ago; you said you’d get back to me. Tried to bring it up earlier but you got all prickly.” When Eugene only frowned harder at the ghostly black and white pictures, he gave an impatient huff and barrelled on. “I’m gettin’ together with some of my friends at Toccoa’s later on, thought you might want to join me. Drinks, music… good company?”

Now it was Eugene’s turn to huff, letting the glamour shot fall to his side and turning a sour look on his friend. Spina hurried to cut off what was sure to be a very long lecture that he’d certainly heard a thousand times before.

“Now, just hear me out!” he went on, “He’s been my friend since we were tykes, Gene, he’s a hell of a guy! A bit of a disaster, sure, but a hell of a guy! And, hey, it ain’t even really a date if you don’t want it to be. Just a bunch of friends going out for some drinks, getting to know one-another. What do you say?”

The earnest, dopey look in his eyes was almost enough to make Gene fold right then and there. Damn his bleeding heart. He’d always had a soft spot for pathetic creatures, it was one of the reasons he went into medicine in the first place. But he was also stubborn and he’d told Spina countless times before, he was _not_ interested in a blind date. Just as he opened his mouth to drive the point home, though, Spina came back swinging.

“Just one!” he pleaded, holding up his index finger like a visual Hail Mary. “Just go on this one date, which ain’t even really a date, and I swear I’ll never bother you about it again. Won’t even tease you when the next old lady proposes to you with her ass hangin’ halfway out of her gown. On my ma’s grave, I swear it!”

“Your mother ain’t dead, Ralph, I spoke to her last week.”

“It’s— that’s not— look, that ain’t the point, Gene. Please?”

The two men fell into an intense staring match and Eugene could feel his resolve crumbling the longer the silence stretched on. Damn it, he did _not_ want to go on a blind date. He wanted to go home and drown himself in blankets and fall asleep to shitty, late night/early morning television and ads for products he would never need but would probably consider buying anyway.

_Merde._

“One!” he sighed, holding out his own index finger, making sure Spina saw it. “Just one, Spina, just this once! Now, please, admit Mrs. Kowalski while I get in touch with the nearest orthopedic surgeon. From what I can see she’ll need at least three pins in that leg if she ever wants to walk again.”

Spina let out a victorious cry, punching the air and grinning from ear-to ear. He walked away with an honest-to-God spring in his step while Eugene could only watch him go with a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach. “ _Encule-moi_ , why do I feel like I’m making a big mistake?”

* * *

It was another three hours before he was able to actually leave the hospital that night, much to the chagrin of the head nurse when she saw him ducking in and out of rooms and being pulled from one patient to the next like a damn lap dog in an old-folks’ home.

First it was giving one of the nurses an extra hand in popping a dislocated shoulder back into place. Then he had to subdue a rowdy patient who was getting much too intimate with a wall and much too violent with Sobel. From there it turned into a blur of blowing up medical gloves for sad little girls and fending off wandering hands from his rear when all he wanted to do was keep a man from bleeding out on the shiny linoleum floor. It was diagnosing kidney stones and bladder infections and bowel obstructions and broken toes, and holding back patients’ hair as they hurled with varying precision into mop buckets. Stitching, slicing and disinfecting until he was absolutely sure no one was going to die on his watch.

Now that he had the chance to stop, though, and the adrenaline (and coffee) was slowly filtering out of his system, he could feel the exhaustion sitting heavy in his bones. It was like his whole body was suddenly made of lead. His head pounded, eyes stung, muscles ached… He could hardly even bring himself to change out of his scrubs but eventually conceded when he caught sight of himself in the washroom mirror and saw the stains that had accumulated over his shift.

Slowly, like moving through molasses, he pulled on some worn jeans and an old henley, and shoved his scrubs carelessly into his gym bag to deal with later. Then he said his goodbyes, gave one last-ditch effort in trying to reason with Spina, and when that didn’t work, begrudgingly let Renée drag him to the front doors before anyone else could intercept them. Outside, she bid him goodnight with a fond smile pulling at one corner of her bow lips, gave him a quick peck on the cheek, then retreated just as easily back into the chaos of the hospital. The sweet scent of her cherry chapstick was a comfort as it followed him down the pavement on his way to his waiting, beat up old Honda.

Eugene knew the get-together Spina had roped him into was at eight that evening, at a place called Toccoa’s; a local pub and hang-out spot he’d only been to a few times before, and since now it was only just past two in the morning he figured he would have plenty of time to get that nap in that he so desperately needed before he had to make himself moderately presentable. There was no room in him right now to feel anxious about who the mystery man Spina wanted to set him up with was, or what he would wear, or what he would say when he got there. His whole body longed for sleep.

Sweet, blissful sleep, and then maybe he could berate himself for agreeing to this stupid rendezvous in the morning.

Until then, he turned the engine, pulled out into the deserted road and headed for home.

The sky was pitch-black, void of stars, but lamp-posts lit the way every few yards with a murky yellow glow. He remembered the stars back in Louisiana. How bright they were; how it looked like someone had flung shining diamonds onto a sea of dark velvet. It was one of the things he missed the most, working in this city; the stars.

Eugene physically shook himself from his depressing thoughts as he pulled up to a stop sign, looking both directions and finding just more dark, empty streets for his trouble. Eyes burned, head screamed, caffeine sloshed nauseatingly around in his hollow stomach. He needed a distraction. Eugene found himself reaching for the radio and at the same time pulling off the brake to roll slowly forward, toggling with the stations and messing with the volume controls.

He had just barely pulled away from the stop sign, settling on a local rock station playing a classic 60s hit— “ _... When I’m not sleepin’ honey, when I ain’t sleepin’ mama, when I’m not sleepin’..._ ” Jackson C. Frank’s dulcet tones crooned lowly through the speakers and Eugene snorted at the irony— when he heard it. A loud horn getting steadily louder, like a mosquito flying straight for your ear. His head snapped up, neck still giving a twinge from all those hours ago, and saw light, light, light, impossibly close, impossibly fast. His heart gave a lurch, floored the brakes, braced himself against his seat before he felt the impact—

“ _... Try another city baby, another town..._ ”

His whole world turned upside down and inside out, rolling head over heels to the nauseating crunch of metal on metal, sliding against the asphalt. Felt the seat belt catch on his chest, the air punched from his lungs, and all the while the radio kept playing.

“ _... Wherever I have gone, wherever I’ve been and gone, wherever I have gone, the blues come followin’ down…_ ”

Eugene Roe saw diamond stars and velvet sky, shattered glass on mangled metal, and then— nothing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title inspired by the Denis Kalytovskyi cover of Dancing With Your Ghost by Sasha Sloan
> 
> _Based off of the Band of Brothers mini-series representations. No harm or offense is intended toward the real life men of Easy Co. or any other historical figures mentioned throughout._


	2. The One With Divine Intervention

“This place is _Heaven!_ ”

Babe Heffron eyed the minimalist interior. The clean, crisp lines, the bullshit feng shui, Kumbaya, modern-hippy refuge, and scrunched his nose like he smelled something foul. It was so clean, so non-offensive, he actually wanted to hurl.

Deborah Maslow, on the other hand, breathed it in like she was smelling daisies; walking around the room like it was the damned Smithsonian.

“It’s been photographed for magazines,” the peppy realtor gushed, voice sickly sweet, clutching her bag like a string of pearls, smile so wide it threatened to pop right off her face.

“No kiddin’.”

It was the sixth place they’d been to today. And, yeah, Babe told himself, six stops, in the grand scheme of things, that wasn’t too bad. Six well-kept lofts in a city as packed and run-down as South Philly, hell, that was almost a damn miracle. Only, the places she kept bringing them to… well, they weren’t great. In fact, it seemed like they just kept getting worse.

Not so much in the scuzzy, piss on the ceiling, blood on the mantelpiece sort of way. But in the _“what in the hell does the nutjob who owns this place look like”_ sort of way. The way that makes you question how wackadoo you have to be to put a giant zen garden in the middle of your apartment in a gross imitation of a litter box.

It was in this moment, standing next to a statue of Buddha and gazing down at the would-be kitty litter, a damn rake protruding crudely out the middle of it, that Babe was gravely regretting not taking Bill up on his previous offer.

The man had just recently bought a house of his own alongside the newly anointed Mrs. Frannie Guarnere. It wasn’t big, by any means, but it had a furnished basement with a decent kitchen and he offered to let Babe sublet it for a fraction of the cost of what he would be paying for a new lease. Of course, Babe had taken advantage for just a few weeks. Just long enough to get back on his feet, save up some money and go apartment hunting. But he didn’t want to stay there indefinitely, no way.

Bill and Frannie were just recently married, after all— hadn’t even gone on a damn honeymoon, and Babe was damned if he was going to be the cause of any stress in this new chapter of their lives. Besides, he was a Heffron, he could make his own way. If there was one thing Heffrons knew how to do, it was how to make the best of a shitty situation. Make lemonade out of piss— or however that saying goes, he never much paid attention.

Point was he’d find something, eventually, he just had to keep looking.

Bill Guarnere himself came sauntering out of the kitchen then, hands in his pockets, all scuffed up shoes, ratty jeans, and leather jacket, giving the sandbox in the middle of the room the stink eye. “Yeah, I thought we said we were gonna need something furnished.”

“Well it... _is_ furnished.”

Babe’s eyes locked on Bill’s before drifting around the sparse room and coming to land on the throw cushions placed deliberately around a small table, which sat no more than three inches off the ground, then finding… well, not much else at all.

“Where’s the damn couch?”

* * *

“Do you believe all of this space?” Deborah’s voice echoed in the loft-style apartment, despite all the large, shapeless objects adorned throughout the room.

Exposed brick, two levels, open windows on the east side. It would have been nice, Babe thought, if not for the Calder-inspired sculptures, backless furniture, and, oh yeah, the fat, looming head of a man smiling down from the wall in the largest and ugliest portrait Babe had ever seen in his young life.

“Yeah, it’ll be great for all those raves you’ll be throwin’, eh Babe?”

Babe could hear Bill’s mocking guffaw echo out from where he was no doubt nosing around in the original occupant’s sock drawers upstairs.

“Aw, stuff it, Gonorrhea.”

The biting effect he was going for was slightly lost, however, when he tried to take a seat on the low, cherry red couch and promptly tumbled straight off the back of it; feet in the air and head straight into what could only be described as a giant Pixar desk lamp spotlighting the mocking face on the wall in front of him.

A loud snort echoed again from upstairs and Deborah clasped her hands in front of her.

“I’m... sensing a no?”

Babe glared up at her from where he sat sprawled out like a marionette on the cement floor.

* * *

They didn’t even bother stepping past the threshold of the next place. Bill took one look at the living room through the doorway; the classical sculptures of naked men adorned throughout the room, the piano that probably cost more than his life, the gold-trimmed table and bookcases, and knew it was a disaster waiting to happen. No way this knucklehead would last two seconds in this place without somehow tripping and setting everything on fire, let alone live there for the foreseeable future. He shuddered at the thought. Without uttering a word, Bill shook his head and closed the door, ushering Babe back down the hallway.

Honestly, Babe had been trying to keep his hopes up all day, but this last place just left him feeling disillusioned. And it seemed the others were starting to pick up on his dampened spirits. Back on the street outside, the atmosphere had unmistakably changed.

“Listen, come back to my place with me, Babe. We’ll give it another few weeks, you can get your bearings, something’s bound to open up that you’ll like.”

“I ain’t living in your basement like a damn sewer rat, Bill.” he grouched, peeling off a brightly coloured flyer that had attached itself to his leg with the wind, throwing it over his shoulder.

“Tch! A sewer rat should be so fuckin’ lucky! Come on, don't be a douche-canoe. You know Fran and I don’t mind putting you up for a little while, kid. Or maybe Julian will let you sleep on his couch. I’m sure his roommate won’t mind. Or—”

“Bill, I ain’t doin’ it. I’m getting a place _today_. End of story.”

“Listen, dumbass—”

“Maybe if you just let me know exactly what you’re looking for—” Deborah piped in, anxiously waving her hands in the air; smile reduced to a fragile imitation of the beaming grin of this morning.

“You already got a couch, and a bed, and you’re stuff’s already moved in—”

“Maybe if you told me a little bit about yourself? Your job, your family situation, maybe a girlfr—”

Babe felt an ugly pang deep in his belly and he hurried to cut her off. “Yeah, I don’t think so, lady.” The flyer clung neatly onto his leg again and he frowned when he shucked it off this time with even more force, his frustration mounting.

“It ain’t gonna kill ya to accept some help, Babe—”

“Okay, then here’s another idea—”

Both ground to a dead halt when the persistent fuschia pink flyer went up into the air this time and came right back down, smack-dab in the middle of Babe Heffron’s face. He could feel himself boiling, wanting to scream, bone-tired and angry, until he actually caught sight of the words printed before him and suddenly stopped.

_SUBLET_ , it said, in bold black letters; _AVAILABLE FOR RENT_. Then underneath that, the attributes of the apartment squished together in shorthand, the address, and a number at the bottom where you could contact the landlord.

He could hear Deborah starting up again, a persistent drone in the background, but he wasn’t paying attention. All his focus zeroed in on the small, unassuming square of paper now clutched in his hands, reading the address and then reading it again just to make sure. He could have sworn…

Babe’s head snapped up, a cautious frown pulling at the corners of his mouth, and peeked around Deborah’s flailing arms to see the number plastered on the side of the building they just left. Yes— 1659, that must mean... He turned around and his belly gave a hopeful flip.

In his time growing up, Babe would often hear the nuns throwing around crazy words like _‘miracles’_ and _‘destiny’_ and _‘divine intervention’_. To which Babe would snort loudly and roll his eyes, and under the Sister’s harsh gaze shuck the blame off in the general direction of his pink, pimply seatmate, Billy Mason. It was all fooey. Hogwash. Bullshit. Things either happened or they didn’t, far as he could tell, and no Big Man in the sky would change his mind. Of course, that being said, if those Sisters were here right now, he’d probably get down on his knees and praise the fuckin’ Lord.

Across the street stood a small three-story apartment building, with ugly salmon pink brick walls peeking out from the climbing ivy which encased it. Even from here he could see that it was in desperate need of repair. The white trim was worn and weathered, peeling in patches to reveal the dark green of the previous paint job underneath. The numbers 1660 were rusted into the wood on a post outside— 1660, just like on the flyer! It was tacky, worn down— probably the ugliest thing Babe had ever seen in his entire life. And in that moment, absolutely beautiful. Without bothering to look, he shoved the paper into Bill’s hands and made to jog eagerly across the street, the man himself following him and sputtering obscenities the whole way, leaving Deborah a blushing, stuttering mess in their wake.

The front door swung open easily as he stumbled inside, where it smelled of a strange mix of dust and whatever burnt concoction the occupants had simmering in the oven for dinner. Faint music drifted down to where they stood on the landing, shuffling with eager anticipation while Deborah wordlessly pulled out her phone and finally dialled that blessed number.

Babe bounced eagerly on his toes as they waited for the landlord to stop by with the keys, physically restraining himself from sighing audibly when the man finally turned up then proceeded to take his sweet time ambling upstairs towards their destination, turning the knob like he was being paid by the damn hour. He didn’t barrel in immediately (he was an adult, goddamn it, it had absolutely nothing to do with Bill’s ironclad grip on the back of his collar), but instead toed cautiously past the threshold with bated breath until he finally stood in the middle of the open foyer.

He kept waiting for obscenely large zen gardens to be waiting for him around the corner. Massive, black and white portraits smiling down from the walls, nude figures perched like lewd gargoyles above the entryways... But they never came. With a tremendous amount of caution, he finally admitted; this was… well hell, it was… _nice!_

The walls were a neutral, muted yellow, with hardwood floors and a natural, dark wood panel trim around open entryways and glass-paned windows. Light cascaded into the room from a yellowed sunroof, casting a warm glow on the floor through dusty sunrays. Two shelving units seemed to be built into the foundation, protruding from the floor to the ceiling, to separate the living area from the dining room and foyer. Furniture old and worn in, mismatched dining chairs, a rusted white space heater, floral curtains… the only modern thing in the place seemed to be the flat screen TV, and even that was far from the latest model. The whole place should have felt old-lady-ish, but it just felt cozy and welcoming. Like a quiet B&B or his Ma’s kitchen...

It felt like coming home.

Behind him, Bill was dutifully asking the important questions, and the landlord was saying something or other about a tragedy in the family while Deborah cooed on sympathetically in the background. Babe wasn’t listening.

He ran his fingers carefully along the wooden shelves, taking everything in with more care than he had probably done anything in his whole damn life. Every surface seemed to be filled with assorted items. A whole life boiled down to these tiny knick-knacks. Novels, cookbooks, and medical texts (more than any sane person should ever think necessary), with big words Babe had no hope of pronouncing. Half melted candles, a dented Zippo, a dusty rosary... He smiled when every once in a while, like Easter eggs, he would find small wooden carvings of colourfully painted alligators, whose heads bobbed up and down when he poked them.

There were no personal photos— none that he could see, at least. But there were a few nondescript paintings hanging on the walls, and one that said something in a foreign language. French? Latin? He wasn’t sure. But whether it was supposed to be cheesy and romantic or witty and playful, he had no idea.

Babe Heffron was a spitfire. A constant whirlwind of jokes and obscenities and stories he found pretty darn interesting but everyone else tended to roll their eyes at. Not even the nuns could get him to shut his trap at the best of times. At this moment, however, he was silent. Felt like one wrong breath could fling him right back into reality, like this was all a dream.

He lowered himself into the plush red couch (not cherry red, no; something deeper; warmer), pushing aside the unnecessary amount of blankets and throw pillows piled on top, and let his eyes wander. The dusty fireplace that seemed like it hardly got used, the rings on the coffee table, seeping into the wood and staining it a darker brown, the slight scent of cigarette smoke that curled into the air when he disturbed the threadbare blanket. Yeah, Babe thought. He could get used to this.

Bill’s heavy, uneven footsteps gave him away as he made his way over, hands on his hips and jaw jutting out in the way he only did when he was feeling sentimental (or snarky— with Bill it was entirely hit or miss).

“You must have someone lookin’ out for your dumb ass, Babe. A/C’s a bit leaky, and there’s a stain in the kitchen that’s either blood or tomato sauce… But it looks good, Babe. Looks real good. And it’s a monthly lease which means you can definitely afford it, even with your job, which is a fuckin’ miracle in and of itself. What do ya think?”

Babe paused, looking unusually serious and contemplative as he bounced up and down on the couch. It was just the right amount of soft but firm, and it didn’t even squeak when he brought himself down hard as he could, right in the middle. There was a small spot on the arm rest where the red of the fabric was charred and melted in the shape of a crescent moon.

Babe looked back up at Bill, brown eyes wide and genuine, and said the only thing he could in that moment; “I like the couch.”

Bill, in turn, cocked an eyebrow and nodded. He turned to Deborah with a shrug and a smirk, and, in an affirming voice— as if that settled the matter— announced: “He likes the couch.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title inspired by the Denis Kalytovskyi cover of Dancing With Your Ghost by Sasha Sloan
> 
> _Based off of the Band of Brothers mini-series representations. No harm or offense is intended toward the real life men of Easy Co. or any other historical figures mentioned throughout._


	3. The One With The Break In

Over the next week, Bill and Julian helped move boxes out of Bill and Frannie’s basement and into Babe’s new apartment. It didn’t amount to much— most of his big stuff was still tucked away in his old bedroom at Ma’s, and some... well, there was just no hope of getting _those_ back. That just left him with a scattered collection of clothes, movies, games, and the sentimental stuff he couldn’t bring himself to toss or leave behind. Evidently he couldn’t bring himself to actually unpack, though, either, as the boxes were currently sitting on and around the dining room table, in various states of address.

He wished he had a legitimate excuse for the mess. Something like life and work getting in the way, but that would be a blatant lie. Nix said point blank that the bar could handle things without him for a few days while he got himself settled. It’s not like he was the only bartender there, and Babe was under no delusions that any of the other guys could take up the role if they really needed to, no problem. And anyways, who in their right mind could be bothered unpacking boxes when faced with snooping around and exploring a new place?

He felt like a little kid all over again, waking up on Christmas morning. Bill and Julian had looked around with a vague, detached sort of interest, but Babe was enthralled, flitting from one room to the next, eagerly drinking in everything he could about his new home.

 _His home_ , he thought again, wistfully.

He found the bedroom pretty easily; it was the only one in the apartment. Compared to the living room it was sparsely decorated; no knick-knacks or photos, just a king-sized bed on a carved wooden frame, tucked into a crescent-shaped wall of windows, a small bedside table and lamp, and a large dresser sitting forlornly on the far side of the room. The bed was fully made and, like the couch in the living room, was piled high in quilts, blankets, and throw pillows. Babe wondered if whoever had come to clean the place out was in a hurry, because the drawers were all empty save a single pair of woolen socks and a small pouch of what appeared to be lavender salts tucked into the corner.

It was on the second day when he found the rooftop access, which he vaguely remembered being mentioned in the flyer but the landlord didn’t care enough to point out. An inconspicuous door in the short hallway inside led to creaky wooden steps with dead leaves swept into the corners, and bowed, wooden cellar doors at the top. An old padlock lay open and forgotten at his feet, completely rusted over.

When he breached the roof, he found that the floor was thick cement, stained and dirty from withstanding years of fickle South Philly weather patterns. A collection of dead potted plants sat in one corner, and a glass ashtray (still full, though congealed from the recent rainfall and spilling over one side) was placed beside them. But the view… Babe wasn’t much for heights, but damn could he get used to a view like this. He imagined how the streets probably lit up at night, how the honking and screaming and tire screeches down below could have been grating to anyone else but just made him feel like home.

He sat up there for what felt like hours that first day but what could only have been several minutes before wearily heading back in to escape the chill. Before he left, though, he quickly swiped up the old ashtray he had spotted earlier, dumping the contents into an empty pot, and bringing it inside to place in a vacant spot amongst the mysterious trinkets. He didn’t smoke much anymore, not after his Ma gave him hell for it when she caught him with a cigarette between his lips last summer, but he still found it hard to completely kick the habit. And, though he’d just been here a couple days, the lingering scent was quickly becoming a comfort. It was stitched into the very fibers of the couch, and pillows, and bedding. Fused itself to the wooden tables and countertops. Not a choking cloud; not like some patrons at the bar came in, smelling like they literally bathed in the ashes, but just strong enough to notice. An after-image, almost, that he hoped wouldn’t fade. It smelled different from his own cigarettes, and he wondered, not for the first time, what brand the previous owner had used.

In fact, these days he found himself wondering a lot about the previous owner. How old they were (Babe had been picturing an older gentleman, with tacky cardigans and snow white hair— but then that didn’t seem right either), and how they acted in the space Babe now occupied. Why they chose to paint the walls yellow, of all colours, instead of green or grey or red.

It was like a puzzle or a riddle Babe was desperate to solve, and eagerly welcomed this new distraction with open arms. From the assortment of mugs in the cabinets— chipped and tea-stained, reading slogans like _#1 Mom, What’s Up Doc?_ and _Gene-Genie_ — to the story behind the mystery stain on the kitchen ceiling. He was sure his buddies were starting to get sick of him constantly texting them with new discoveries he’d made about the place— though he refused to tell them everything. Like the way he found himself snuggling deeper into his pillows and bedsheets at night, chasing the fading scent of smoke and aftershave that still lingered there. Or how he traced the worn, chicken-scratch writing scrawled into the margins of every dog-eared cookbook with a careful finger, paying special attention to where the ink had pooled or smudged over the years, memorizing the lines in the fingerprints they left behind.

No, those moments were just for Babe.

After the third day, however, with Bill paying a visit to drink beers while they set up his internet and cable, new discoveries became less frequent and he finally started to settle down.

He was due back at work in a few days, so Babe was determined to make the most of the rest of his time off. Which, of course, meant gluing himself to the couch for the foreseeable future and not moving except to piss, shit, and drag his sorry ass into bed at the end of the night. Maybe. Julian would be proud. Bill, probably, not so much.

It was now Friday night and Babe was sprawled out in his sweats on the red couch, watching Seinfeld reruns on Netflix and feeling like a fat, lazy king amongst his horde of empty pizza boxes and days-old Chinese take-out, intermittently sipping on a lukewarm Yuengling and marveling at the way it made his fingertips feel pleasantly fuzzy. Part of him felt guilty for letting the place get to such a state in the first place, but he promised himself he would clean it up next week when things returned to normal. For now he emptied the last drops of beer onto his tongue as Jerry worried over a puffy shirt on screen, deposited the empty bottle on the table next to its buddies, and pushed himself up on increasingly unsteady feet to get another.

He was just walking out of the kitchen, cooled beer in one hand and a bottle opener in the other, when he happened to glance up and suddenly felt his heart leap straight into his throat, making itself comfortable in the squishy lining around his trachea.

Everything was exactly the same as it had been not two minutes ago. The boxes on the table, the mess in the living room. He could faintly hear the TV still droning on in the background as a car whizzed by outside.

But now, planted in the middle of the apartment, as if he was meant to be there and had been all along, stood a man. Maybe a few years older, but no taller than Babe himself, with a shock of dark hair and a confused frown etched onto his pale face— which, that’s a fuckin' laugh, what did _he_ have to be confused about?

If asked later, Babe would say that the sound which came out of his mouth just then was nothing short of a rugged, manly yell. Absolutely no one would believe him. In fact, it burst out more as a loud, girly shriek than anything, which he promptly followed up by dropping his beer in a fanning spray of white foam, and stumbling backwards with all the grace of a dead gazelle.

The room listed nauseatingly off its axis. In less than a second he was on the floor, slipping on the puddle at his feet and landing with a dull thud on his back. A sickening crack quickly followed, reverberating through his skull as his head bounced against the old floorboards. Babe groaned. He’d definitely be feeling _that_ in the morning.

“ _Shit!_ What in the—”

“The hell are you doin’ in my house?”

Babe blinked up at the man with wide eyes, taken aback at the smooth, southern drawl. Of all the things he expected to come out of his mouth, that was most definitely not it. Mouth fell open, closed, and open again, gaping like a fish, unsure how to respond.

He felt like a damn deer caught in the headlights; afraid to move under the stranger’s piercing gaze and heart jackhammering away in his throat. How long had he been there? How did he even get in? What must have only been a few minutes felt like an eternity; Babe lying on the floor in a sad heap of tangled limbs, ass sopping wet with alcohol, and the man gazing back in equally confused trepidation, neither one willing to be the first to step down from the strange staring contest they had somehow stumbled their way into. 

Babe couldn’t help but wonder if, after all these years, this was how he was meant to go out. If God planned it this way, as retribution for all the times he mouthed off in Catholic school. No peace, no dignity. Just sitting in a puddle of beer, waiting for death, wondering if his would-be-killer’s eyes were just blue, or more slate grey. And— oh God, he was going to die while daydreaming about his killer’s eyes, of fucking course he was. Slowly, as if any sudden movement would propel the man forward, Babe brought his elbows firmly underneath himself, propping himself up a little straighter, and rubbed his eyes with his dry hand, desperately hoping the man would be gone when he opened them again.

No such luck. In fact, somehow he only managed to look more frustrated, crossing his arms and raising one stern eyebrow at the redhead on the floor. Finally, he shifted his weight, one foot to another, and Babe immediately snapped out of it. He scooted back a few feet, leaving a wet trail with his ass, and brought his hands out in front of himself in surrender.

“Don’t kill me!” Babe squeaked, still sprawled on the floor like a ragdoll. “I ain’t got anything worth takin’, honest, but you can have whatever you want!”

The man looked even more confused at that, then only seemed to grow more annoyed. “Excuse me?”

“There’s, like, twenty bucks in my wallet— take it!”

That only caused him to shake his head and roll his eyes, looking down at Babe like he’d had enough. “Get out of my house or I’m callin’ the cops,” he insisted, “I got no trouble giving you money for a cab or drivin’ you to the homeless shelter—”

“Homeless who, now?”

“But I’m going to need you to get out of my home.”

Babe blinked. Wait, hold the phone… Was this guy serious?

Lifting himself up from the sweet, sticky mess on the ground, Babe crossed his arms. He imagined he probably didn’t look half as intimidating as he wanted, bruised and covered in beer, vision swaying, but the principal still stood. “Listen, you have it all wrong, buddy. _You_ were robbin’ _me_ , remember? This ain’t your house, this is _my_ house. My name’s on the damn lease! How’d you even get in here anyway?”

“ _Your_ name?”

Babe nodded, as if the matter was closed.

“Your name. That’s funny, ‘cause I’ve been living here for the past _four years_. Pretty sure I would have remembered gettin’ a damn roommate. _C’est ridicule, ça,_ I’m calling the police. _Pourquois je me dispute avec cet homme? Je n’ais pas besoin de ça..._ ”

“What, are you Spanish now? Hey, I’m talking to you, buddy!”

Babe made to follow the man as he bulldozed past him, presumably to use the tacky, beige landline which was still installed in the kitchen (which, really, what was this, the 80s?). He muttered to himself in a fast-paced tongue the entire time, and Babe wasn’t sure if he should be impressed or offended. Probably the latter; his tone of voice didn’t exactly sound neighbourly.

“Go ahead, call the cops,” he goaded, watching the man turn the corner to where he knew the landline sat perched on a wall beside the cabinets and chasing after him. He felt like he was getting whiplash, but whether it was from the fall or this conversation, he wasn’t sure. “They’ll be on my side though, I hope you know that. I’m tellin’ you, you’re gonna look pretty— ...stupid… when they get here...”

Babe whipped his head around, but all he saw was an empty kitchen. Dark cabinets, linoleum floor, stained ceiling… The phone was still on the hook, exactly where it had been since the day he moved in, not a dust bunny out of place.

He called out, waiting to hear the deep, southern drawl and disgruntled muttering from another room, but nothing came. He was alone.

The man was gone, and it was as if he’d never even been there in the first place.

Babe grew gravely quiet for the rest of the night after that, zoned out and on-edge; half expecting this guy to walk out of the walls, ranting and raving with the receiver clutched in hand. Part of him deliberated calling the cops anyway, but what would he say? _“Help, there’s a madman on the loose who thinks I’m squatting in my own house— yes I’ve had a few drinks, why do you ask?”_ Yeah, no thanks. Spending the night in a looney bin was so _not_ on his agenda of things to do tonight.

Instead, he quickly found himself surrendering into a near daze; mopping up the puddle of beer with wet cloths and an old shirt he managed to dig out of one of the boxes. He tried to lose himself again in the tinny laugh-track on his TV, but every little creak in the floorboards made him jump.

Before he went to bed that night he did a few laps around the apartment and deliberately double-checked and triple-checked the locks on every one of his doors and windows, even making a point to lay his old baseball bat safely on the pillow next to him, arms locked across his chest but ready to grab the bat and swing at a moments’ notice. He could hardly bring himself to close his eyes; found them constantly flitting back to the locked bedroom door, or the windows above his bed, afraid he would see a pale face staring back at him from beyond the panes. It was nearing three in the morning when he found his eyelids drifting shut against his will; consciousness drifting in and out, floating on the razor’s edge of oblivion.

 _Tomorrow,_ he thought, slow and drowsy, and a little bit just out of reach. Tomorrow he’d go to the hardware store, first thing, and buy the biggest damn lock he could find. Tonight, he needed some fucking sleep...

**Author's Note:**

> Title inspired by the Denis Kalytovskyi cover of Dancing With Your Ghost by Sasha Sloan
> 
> _Based off of the Band of Brothers mini-series representations. No harm or offense is intended toward the real life men of Easy Co. or any other historical figures mentioned throughout._


End file.
